Science: Well-Behaved Engine

Every new airplane engine starts out in life as a fairly simple machine
but gets more & more complicated as it grows up. Ram jets are no
exception. The early models were hardly more than hollow
cylindersenchantingly simple, but also extremely inefficient. Their
"fires" often blew out, and there was no adequate way to control their
power output. So the engineers went to work to educate the ram jet and
teach it how to act as a well-behaved engine should. Recently the
Wright Aeronautical Corp. told how a grown-up supersonic ram jet works.